Unloving Heart
by Jayden Mackenzie
Summary: Itachi hates having nightmares, but what he hates more than a plain old nightmare is a nightmare with Sasuke in it. This is a two part story in which Itachi expresses his love and hate for his brother. Don't read if you don't know of their past. Spoilers.
1. The Kunai

**Disclaimer: **I own nothing of _Naruto_, however all creative liberties belong to me. The fiction story line is purely mine, and views on what characters look like (such as hair or eye) is also mine.  
**Authors Note: **If you've yet to learn about Sasuke's brother and their past, this is not a fic for you. Do not read it as there are some spoilers within. Please note that all postings by myself are in semi-AU form. Thank you!

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**  
**_Itachi groaned as he sat up in bed, raven black hair glossy in the stray moonlight gazing down upon him through the wide open window. Warm summer air blew into the home causing the curtains to flutter in the breeze, slender tree branches had shadows wriggling upon the wall. On the floor were strewn clothes, a jacket of black on the outside with red clouds and a smooth red lining on the inside, a dark gray shirt hung off the side of the bed that had been removed in the hot night. Trousers covered the seat of a desk chair, conical straw hat displaced under the bed. Itachi's fists rubbed his eyes, fingertips removing the sleep from aside the bridge of his nose. Deep seeded lines creased as he squinted and blinked in the dim light, red eyes opening fully after some time to look upon the messy room._

_This wasn't his room._

_Blinking again Itachi hoped to wake, but he already was, at least in this world. Brows furrowing in the usual anger he swung his legs over the edge of the bed and stood up, however, he fell immediately to his knees upon letting out a guttural groan after stepping on something. Looking behind him he saw it was a dull edged kunai. He knew it, far too well, and his head started to pulse with pain as his memory bank flooded with thoughts of his little brother. Clenching his teeth in agony his elbows slammed into the wood floor as he leaned forward, curling up, hoping to push the images away._

"Itachi! Itachi!"

_"Get out of my head." Itachi said as he slowly got to his feet, the right one bleeding from the prick of the weapon on the padding of his sole. His eyes looked around, ragged, hoping to find something to make it stop. Anything. But there was nothing to protect him from the images that stampeded into his minds eye, all the images of Sasuke looking up at Itachi with hopeful eyes. Itachi saw himself shun the boy away and go on with his work, and then as suddenly as the painful sight barraged against him they were gone. Silence fell upon the room and it was worse than the remembrances of Sasuke._

_Taking some steps away from the bed, Itachi looked around the small room. It was the younger Uchiha's room from long, long ago. He went to the window, the sights outside the same as he knew they would be. This was some kind of illusionary jutsu? Itachi didn't remember getting into a fight, and certainly not with anyone who could perform this attack. A dream? No… he hadn't fallen asleep, not to his recollection anyhow. This was very, very strange._

"Itachi?"_ the voice was small, it came from behind. Itachi spun around, glossy black hair flying out before lapping against his forehead and over his eyes. No one._

_"Who's here?" he asked, walking toward the bedroom entrance. There was still no one around, just more silence so quiet it was deafening. Something was wrong here._

_Itachi mulled over the problem a moment in the bedroom before deciding to see if this was actually his old house. Stepping through the doorway and into the hall he found himself falling, but stopped with a thud as he fell to the wall which was now the floor. A framed photograph on the wall cracked as he crashed into it, glass breaking and cutting into his skin. It hardly bothered him, passing it off as a pinprick as he rolled onto his rear and looked up at the bedroom which had once been behind him. Now it was _above_ him, had the entire house just tilted?_

_Apparently so, for all the rooms around him were also on their side, the right half of the house now the floor. Itachi shook his head and stood up, sighing slightly as he got to his feet. Blood dripped onto the image once hidden behind glass and he entered the kitchen. Again the house shifted, this time onto it's left half. However, the Uchiha murderer was somewhat prepared and caught himself by grabbing the window sill._

_"This is wrong." he murmured to himself, the room now also void of color and left in only black and white. Just like the photo he'd crushed, monochromatic in color from whites to black and all the gray in between. Dropping to the "floor" Itachi stood on a cabinet and looked around the room, deciding on what he should do. He came to the conclusion that no matter where he went the house would turn one way or another as soon as he stepped through and entry way. Looking up at the window he vaguely pondered if he could climb out it and end this nightmare._

"Itachi." _Again the voice echoed but no one was there. This time the brother knew it was Sasuke. With his young sibling haunting him like this he would never climb the cliff and return to normalcy. But was normalcy really something any ninja had? Probably not._

_"Sasuke. Where are you?" Itachi called, jumping over the stove to the opposing cupboard and standing upon that. He heard it crack and then break beneath him, quickly his feet moved to the once ceiling and counter and held him up. Looking down between his legs at the brown cupboard he saw no food inside. Rather, it was a black void of nothingness, no back to it and the space just kept on going. Lowering himself, he let his right arm hang into the rectangular space to feel frigged air swirl around. The hand moved and ripped open the unbroken door. Food._

_"Their fucking with me." hissed the Uchiha angrily as he looked up at the windows. Leaping up from ceiling to floor, then back again he crossed the room in a zigzag pattern and stood on the table legs. Somehow everything by he stuck to the wooden base. Scratching at the window, he tried to pry it open. All he managed was to chip his purple nail polish in the process and swore once again._

_How was he supposed to get out of this if the windows didn't even open. Of course that meant the door was stuck shut as well, he reasoned, and closed his eyes._

"Brother."

_"Shut up."_

"Itachi!"

_"SHUT UP!" Itachi's hand balled into a fist and struck at the window, eyes still closed. He heard the sound of shattering glass and looked at the space before him. Another black void. Jumping off the table legs in annoyance he dove back into the hall, then into the entrance room. The house yet again turned, this time the floor on the ceiling, and all of it a black void. Itachi wasn't sure he wanted to find out where it went, and thus clung to the furniture over his head. His unloving heart be wildly in his chest, lungs breathing air in heavily and rapidly as he lost his cool. _No,_ he told himself. _I must stay calm, or else there is no other way out of this.


	2. The Rain

-1**Disclaimer:** I own nothing of _Naruto_, however all creative liberties belong to me. The fiction story line is purely mine, and views on what characters look like (such as hair or eye) is also mine.  
**Authors Note:** If you've yet to learn about Sasuke's brother and their past, this is not a fic for you. Do not read it as there are some spoilers within. Please note that all postings by myself are in semi-AU form. Thank you!

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_"I need to find him." Itachi said through a deep breath as he moved over to the left wall and stood upon it, arms crossed over his chest as he faced the black hole swirling below him. Sasuke's voice echoed in his mind, calling his name, reaching out to him… Another horrible image flashed on the theatre screen in his mind of the little boy waving to him with that smile he'd had so many years ago. It flickered quickly, colors inverting before Sasuke was starting to fade into the distance. Itachi wanted to run to Sasuke, to grab him around the throat and strangle him. He wanted to kill his kid brother, be the only Uchiha left. Then he would have this daunting nightmare sleep after sleep, never leaving him, never letting him awake to the reality until sun up._

"Sasuke!" he screamed, eyes snapping open. He hadn't realized they'd even been closed, but upon looking around he was no longer in his old home. The Uchiha estate was nowhere nearby, he was in a field all alone. Standing upright in its center, trees in an odd circle surrounding him kilometers away, he grinned. It was a grin of insanity, of madness. Finally his lips parted and he laughed, that dangerous smirk upon his face as he threw his head back and stared up at the black sky.

"I've won." he whispered as rain poured down from the gray clouds darkening the field. Wind rippled through the space, the liquid drops blowing in a slant. Quickly Itachi was soaked, laughing in his psychotic victory with arms open wide. Pale skin dripped with the wetness, spheres of water falling from his fingertips, naked chest rising and fallen rhythmically with his cachinnate. It ran down his flesh, over his abs and hips into his low hanging trousers which clung to his body through their heavy moistness.

"Itachi."__

Instantly Itachi turned around, laugh gone and face once more angry and set into place. His red eyes searched wildly like that of a beast hunting it's pray. Stepping out of his stand point, the grass he'd been covering quickly soaked up the rain. Where is he? _The man asked himself, looking here and there and suddenly around the trees once he'd teleported over. _WHERE?

"Here." _the voice came. He spun around, but another "here" came from to his left, then right, then all over at once. Itachi threw his fist at the closest tree, knuckles bleeding on impact. Sasuke was there in the woods with him, he could feel his brothers presence, but where?_

"Sasuke. Come out now." Itachi demanded in a harsh tone, backing up into the field. There was a clutching of pain in his right thigh and he was forced to look down. A small black haired youth stood there, left hand holding a kunai which jut from Itachi's skin and trousers. "Sasuke…" he hissed. Reaching down he grabbed the kunai and chucked it across the field out of the boys hand. The younger looked up to Itachi with sad eyes, upset that his brother wasn't going to play.

"But Itachi. You promised to teach me to throw today."_ Sasuke said with a whiny voice. _"You promised!" _His voice grew deeper then as Sasuke suddenly grew up in a second. His little boy clothes changed into that of what he wore now affiliated with Orochimaru. White with a purple twist belt. His hair was longer, hanging over the sides of his face, and his eyes were red. Half of his bodies skin was covered in a black fiery mark, the left side of his face still changing until it stopped on the grotesque look that he inherited from the Seal._

Itachi stared into his brothers eyes, his face emotionless as he looked upon his brother. It was still Sasuke, and he was still going to kill him. This is where he became truly heartless, hate turning black as night his soul. It smelled like acid and tasted like chemicals, ripping and tearing at his body until he was nothing but a murderous shell.

"You're not a good brother." _Sasuke hissed as he raised up his long silver sword. Itachi glanced at it and then back to Sasuke. They smirked and Itachi realized just how much like himself his brother had become. But this is where it ended._

"You're not a good brother either, Sasuke." Spoke the elder, voice filled with malice. "Following me down that path, just for revenge? And what are you going to do after you defeat me, if you defeat me?" he asked smoothly, stepping back. His hands reached down to wear weaponry pouches normally sat, but he had none. However, Uchiha Itachi did not panic, he just let his arms slowly slid down his body until they hung there.

"I will recreate what you stole." __

"How's that? You can not avenge our name by killing me, you only kill yourself."

"Then so be it!"_ Sasuke lunged at Itachi, sword point headed straight for his chest. Itachi moved at the last moment, side stepping and bringing his right forearm down on the back of his brothers neck, the left hand coming out and grabbing hold of the right wrist._

"You're still weak. That is why you can not save Us. Until you can defeat me you are nothing, and after that you are loathed. People will hate you more than me, more than I do you, because you could not win and protect those fools."

Sasuke moved away quickly as Itachi brought down his arm, but his wrist was still caught in the cold grip of his brother. Neither hands able to come together, he could not perform any jutsu, and unable to swing his blade, he was weakened further and defenseless. However, Itachi let him go. Falling to his hands and knees he quickly rolled over and stood, but he was already fading from the dream world.

"You will never win." Itachi hissed as he watched his brother leave him. Slowly Sasuke returned to his childhood state he'd originally appeared in before he was completely gone. With a sigh Itachi passed his bloody hand through his hair and closed his eyes.

Upon waking, sun shining through the bedroom window, he sat up quickly and looked around. It was his own blank room, filled with nothing but some clothes, weapons, and his soaked body on the bed. Smirking, he looked at the floor, but frowned quick as his eyes caught a glimpse of a dull edged kunai…


End file.
